A new report by the city's Independent Budget Office compares per-student public support for charter schools with that of district schools. While it finds funding parity between charters co-located in public school buildings and their district-school counterparts, charters that operate in private space receive nearly $3,000 less per student.
Legislation passed in Albany last year will narrow that gap for new and expanding charters, but it's time to offer support for older, established charters, too.
Five years ago, the Independent Budget Office calculated that co-located charter schools received nearly $650 more per student in public funding than district schools. The new report shows that the gap has closed. District schools spent $17,928 per general-education student last year, compared with $17,899 in co-located charter schools. The change is largely due to the fact that the new teachers union contract raised salaries and pension costs in district schools, and charter funding hasn't kept pace. (Most charters are nonunion.)
The real disparity is now within the charter sector. Budget office figures show that charter schools in private space (about 40% of charters) receive about $2,900, or 16%, less funding per student than both their co-located charter counterparts and district schools. This puts them at a significant disadvantage — money that should go for teachers, books and materials instead goes to pay rent.
A recent New York City Charter School Center analysis showed the average city charter school in private space spends nearly $670,000 in rent, enough to pay for an additional eight teachers.
A state law passed last year offers up to $2,775 per student in facilities support for new or expanding charter schools in the city that request space in public school buildings but are denied it. That should close much of the gap for new charters. But charter schools in private space that have already reached full size — 39 schools serving 21,000 students — don't qualify for the additional funds, and growing schools will receive that funding only for students in the new grades.
This policy is irrational. Steve Klinsky, a founder of one of New York's first charter schools, the Sisulu-Walker Charter School of Harlem, states: “Our school has been serving this community since 1999. It doesn't make any sense that a charter that opens across the street gets $3,000 more per student. It's just not equitable. . . . Sisulu has outperformed the nearby traditional public schools despite millions less in public funding over the last 15 years. Just think how good it could be if funding were fair!”
The Independent Budget Office report is sure to be introduced as evidence in an education-equity lawsuit making its way through the courts. Charter school parents from Buffalo, Rochester and New York City are challenging the funding allocated to their schools operating in private space. The lawsuit seems to have merit, given that charters outside New York City aren't eligible for facilities funding and charters in the city serving kids in the same neighborhood get drastically different amounts of money.
But this issue doesn't have to be left to the courts. Mayor de Blasio has voiced support for smaller, independent charter schools, which are likelier to be located in private space and tend to receive less philanthropic support than charters that are part of large networks. Maybe he could extend an olive branch to the charter sector and work with Gov. Cuomo on a common-sense reform.
The facilities-funding provision in state law is something of an unfunded mandate, as it requires the city to totally fund charter facilities support. To level the playing field, the state could set up a charter-facilities fund to be matched by support from local districts. This wouldn't be a heavy lift as the state itself already spends well over a billion dollars annually on K-12 capital expenses.
It makes no sense to penalize the charter pioneers that have been around the longest. It's time for Albany to give all charters a fair shot at success.
This piece originally appeared in New York Daily News